14 DAY TRIAL // The World Intellectual Property Organization published a patent describing a full-screen fingerprint scanner invented by Samsung has been published by on October 18 according to a report by LetsGoDigital.
The patent was filed on April 18 and it describes in detail how the smartphone manufacturer can build a fingerprint scanner which, unlike other such devices available on their competitors' phones, can detect fingerprints using the entire display's surface instead of making use of a small pre-defined area.
"The present disclosure may provide a method for acquiring fingerprint information, by which high-brightness light emission for a fingerprint sensing area may be controlled by utilizing light by driving of a display as a light source utilized for recognition of a fingerprint, and an electronic device supporting the same," says the published patent.
As described in Samsung's "Method for acquiring biometric information and electronic device supporting the same" patent, the touch sensor array that provides biometric information will be controlled by at least one secondary low-power processor, which will also control the amount of light projected from the display when scanning fingerprints.
The secondary processing unit controlling the fingerprint scanner will also be able to "control high-brightness light emission of the biometric information sensing area by controlling a specific light emission function," making it a lot easier to scan fingerprints when wet or dirty fingers.
Samsung's patented full-screen in-display fingerprint scanner to be controlled by a secondary processor
The high brightness mode (HBM) fingerprint scanning process works by taking three different scans using three levels of screen brightness, composing into a single fingerprint scan for more precise recognition and authentication.
Furthermore, the fingerprint scanner co-processor will be able independent from the main SoC since Samsung's published patent also states that while "the processor is in a sleep state, the electronic device may control the sensor module."
It is not yet sure if and when future Samsung devices will come with an in-screen fingerprint scanner (although Samsung also has a patent for this exact tech) but, if the Koreans use it, the most probable candidate for their first smartphone with such tech will be next year's flagship, the Galaxy S10.
If the Samsung Galaxy S10 includes this feature, it definitely won't be the first such phone on the market, with Huawei, Vivo, Oppo, and Xiaomi all having already released at least one such device.
According to some rumors, the Galaxy S10 will be unveiled in February 2019, the moment when we will know for sure if Samsung's new flagship features a full-screen in-display fingerprint scanner, and if it's an in-house made one, an ultrasonic sensor from Qualcomm, or an optical one from Goodix.
